Snail beats snake
by morgannia
Summary: speculative futurefic, SakuSasu. sometimes coming to the terms is the hardest feat to accomplish. in a future, when Sakura is lost, she finds peace from the most unlikely person.


**Snail beats snake, snake beats toad, toad beats snail**

AN: this story was written for the lj com narutowishlist, my giftee requested this particular pairing, which despite my misgivings i went ahead & write to the best of my ability . . . all in all, i think it came out, very well :D without my beta-readers - ivory-tenshi & limequartz from lj, i have _no_ idea how this would have turned out, so much thanks goes out to them.

i don't own Naruto & any & all errors are all mine. enjoy.

* * *

"_Sakura . . ."_ The Uchiha whispered smoothly as he leaned against the door frame. His obsidian eyes gazed at her, sending very familiar chills up her spine.

_'I have to stop this.'_

"No...no I don't have time for this." Sakura broke eye contact as she gathered her supplies that laid on the floor.

"That never stopped you before." he hissed into her ear as he got hold of her.

_'He's right.'_

"I don't care," Sakura lied as she shrugged off his hand. "I'm tired and I have double shift tonight. I can't handle this-you right now, so leave me alone because I don't want to see you!"

"Who's lying now?" He taunted her, a smirk of bitter satisfaction curled his lips making Sakura flinch. "I couldn't even be here, if you didn't want me as your dirty little secret."

Staring down at the floor, Sakura's teeth bit deeply into her lower lip. For Kami's sake, she was twenty-five years. Why did she let him get to her this way?

"So go then, run back to your lord and master, since you do it so well."

_'He'll leave us for good.'_

What makes you think I haven't tried leaving?" Sasuke hissed. "Every damn time I try to leave, you always call me back. Make no mistake, Sakura-_chan,_ this is all your doing, not mine!"

Suddenly she felt like she twelve years old again, his obvious disdain as cutting as ever and yet . . . he was still holding her, still there just as real as all her memories.

Much as she hated herself for it, Sakura felt herself weakening. If she didn't leave that soon, then they'd wind up back on the floor again.

"No! _This is sick!_ It's wrong! So damned wrong! Let me go!" With a strength born of desperation, she wrenched herself free, nearly stumbling to the floor.

She felt gentle hands catch her before she could hit and carefully lower her to the floor, before retreating as if they never were. He moved across the room, leaving an empty path to the doorway and watched her with those dark eyes that saw through her so easily.

"I'm not the one holding on." His words hung quietly in the air.

Sakura glanced at him, tears welling in her eyes, before with a muffled sob, she all but ran out the door. Slamming it shut, she barely managed not to collapse against it. . With a deep breath, she willed herself to blink back the tears that her pride refused to allow her to shed, and when that wasn't enough, she roughly swiped at her face with calloused palms.

* * *

Walking across Konoha, Sakura kept her focus firmly in front of her, step by step, seeking a state of detachment. Her head rose slightly, when she heard laughter and raised voices, although she couldn't quite make out the words. Green eyes softened a bit as she realized that she was coming up onto the academy. Sure enough as she turned the corner there were children gathered in the playground. A faint smile crossed her lips as she approached, idly curious as to which game they were playing.

Someone must have recognized her as they grew still, too still for academy students, but the few with their backs to her, remained oblivious. Sakura's eyebrows knitted in confusion, wondering what was going on. Then she heard it, a gleeful cry of playful excitement,

"Snail beats . . . " An older child, quickly elbowed the younger girl, who turned about in bewilderment, her mouth forming an exaggerated 'O' of horrified surprise.

She stiffly turned away amid a flurry of abject apologies, knowing all too well that if she didn't, things would have gotten ugly.

They were only children, innocent children playing a foolish game and meant no harm. Intellectually, she knew that, but after earlier . . . it was all still too raw. It wouldn't have been right to take out her anger on them.

And she had so much rage, bound up only by a thin strand of control . . .

The irony given her chosen profession didn't escape her. She kept walking to the only job she was fit for.

Sakura knew she would never again see combat. Even if, by some miracle, she could bring herself to the field, the current Hokage would never allow it. After all these years, he still sought to protect her, despite her many past failings.

Finally arriving at the hospital, Sakura stoically began her rounds passing patients and staff with the same jaded eyes. Whatever pride she had once taken in her teens, over the years, had been corrupted into a wearied resignation. It was no wonder to her anymore that Tsuande had spent so many years wandering aimlessly. She only wished she had the strength of will to leave, if it hadn't been for Naruto, she might have tried.

She dropped off some paperwork at the primary medic-nin station and turned around, only to blanch white. Coming through the doors was a bloodied Konohamaru, half stumbling, half carried by his fellow chunins Moegi and Udon - Naruto's old genin squad.

She couldn't quite hold back her sob of horror, while from behind her a squad of medic-nins rushed in, shouting out orders. She watched in a state of morbid fascination as Hinata moved in to begin immediate triage.

Standing there, she noticed somewhat absently that Hinata nodded at one of the nurses who reluctantly left Konohamaru to walk over and taking her by the hand led her to a nearby chair.

"Sakura-san, you appear to be in shock. Are you feeling faint?"

Sakura gazed at her blankly for a moment. "Is he going to be alright?" Even to her own ears, Sakura's words sounded hesitant and almost childish. A distant and quiet voice in her head that almost sounded like _him_ was commanding her to get a hold of herself and take control of the situation, but as she weakly fell into the chair, the pink-haired jounin doubted that her legs would be able to carry her the few feet necessary.

With what appeared to be an exasperated sense of annoyance on her face, the nurse sighed heavily.

"It's certainly serious, although with proper care, he should recover."

Seemingly oblivious to the drama behind her, Hinata focused on her patient.

"What happened?" The abrupt question seemed to take Udon by surprise, half of attention on his friend, the other half on Sakura.

"Ummm - "

And as if glad for the distraction, Moegi laughed shortly. "We were surprised while patrolling the Forest of Death and he was on us before we knew what was happening." She glanced down at her hands still covered in his blood and had to swallow back her gag reflex.

"But we got him back in time, right?"

Hinata spared the young girl a reassuring smile, before returning to the task at hand. "Yes, Moegi, your sensei would be very proud." After another moment or so, she stood up, peeled off her blood-stained gloves and dropped them into a receptacle hanging off of the stretcher and stretched her back. "Ok, he's stable for now, someone take him up to ICU and please show his teammates to a room where they can clean up before seeing him."

"Someone . . . someone should notify the Hokage," Sakura spoke up quietly.

"Already done," Udon replied. "With . . ." Moegi abruptly elbowed him in the stomach, pointedly nodding at Sakura, "ummm, yeah an S-class missing-nin, we uh told the first jounin we saw coming in."

Hinata looked from Moegi to Sakura, before making her decision. "Ok, then. Well, that was a bit of excitement," as the nurses rushed around to comply with her orders.

She waved off the nurse with Sakura and waiting until the entranceway was cleared out a bit and walked over to her friend, who was still staring aimlessly at the floor. Crouching down next to Sakura she looked up at the other woman. Her voice pitched lower than usual she tentatively asked, "How are you doing?"

"Other than nearly falling apart in my own hospital, you mean?" Sakura scoffed, closer to hysteria than not. "Oh just fucking great, Hina-chan and you?"

Sighing, Hinata pushed herself up off the floor and eased into the next chair over. "It's ok, you know," she counseled in a gently voice. "Everyone freaks out once in a while. I'd be more worried if you didn't occasionally."

"Once in a while I could handle, but this isn't exactly once in a while and you know it as well as I do." The words ripped out of some dark place inside of her. "I mean look at me, Hinata, _really_ look at me." Sakura demanded, turning and holding out her shaking hands.

"Tsuande may have been afraid of blood, but when it mattered, when she needed to, she was still able to work, but me? When I see someone I know, I fucking fall apart. I can't function like this. I just can't do it. If you hadn't been here, if it had depended on me, we both know Konohamaru would have died."

"But he didn't," the dark-haired jounin pointed out. "Burn out happens, it's one of the risks of being a medic-nin," she shrugged.

Sakura laughed harshly. "Please, don't condescend to me Hinata. I was doing this long before you even became a chunin, let alone passed the medic-nin exam."

"Exactly my point," the Hyuga noted a little more sharply than before.

"And that's _all_ you've been doing. You haven't left Konoha for years – not on a mission or even a vacation. Hell, you don't even take time off. If you're not here, you're what? You're sleeping, training, spending hours at the memorial? Or maybe you're off, visiting the Hokage, not that you've even done that in weeks. It's not healthy and as a medic-nin, you should know that much."

"If people want to see you, they have to find you here, since you apparently live for the overtime. You think people don't notice? _You think I don't notice?_ I know for a fact that you've logged in over 250 hours this month and it's only been three weeks." Hinata ran a hand through her hair. "I've been as patient with you as I can, but – "

"No," Sakura finally cut in, her words nearly spilling over each other in desperation. "You can't take me off the schedule. I refuse! This is still _my_ hospital, Hyuga! I'll take it to the Hokage if I have to."

"And he'll tell you the same thing I am," she countered unsympathetically. "You're off for the next two weeks, without exception."

Sakura's mouth fell open for one interminably long moment. "No . . ." She shook her fiercely head in denial, "You can't do that to me, Hinata, you _can't!_ You know why I have to work, you know!"

Hinata's pale eyes gentled compassionately as she heard the imploring note in Sakura's voice all but begging her.

"Yes, I know, but Sakura . . . you must realize that you aren't the first person to lose someone you love and you won't be the last. You cannot continue on this path. Only self-destruction lays that way and if you'd be honest with yourself, you'd know it's the truth. I'm here if you want to talk, but I won't be a party to helping you kill yourself."

Looking at the runt of her genin class sit there and mouth meaningless platitudes at her, Sakura didn't know whether to laugh at the absurdity of it all or tear out her hair in despair. Not that it matter much, either way, neither option would get her what she wanted and nothing really could. Besides she knew that resolute face when she saw it.

Hinata was stone cold serious, which meant that she must have the Hokage's backing. Sakura realized with a curious sense of loss that for the first time in her life, she really was without any allies anymore.

So there was nothing left to do, but to try and salvage a graceful withdrawal. Bracing herself with a deep breath, she had to force herself not to gag on the noxious mixture of antiseptic and bitter iron smell of blood oxidizing in the air. She nodded slightly at Hinata, with a distant smile on her face, before turning and slowly walking outside.

* * *

It was dark now, the sharp November air chilling her all the way through skin and bones to her very core. The light of the moon and a few straggling stars gave the village an otherworldly gleam, enough to see by, but haunting nonetheless. She passed her namesake, a grove of cherry trees, but the famous bloom of Konoha had long since faded away, with only a few scattered blossoms stubbornly clinging to desolate branches, despite the cutting winds. It was almost painful to see.

The streets were empty and silent as she wrapped her arms around her body; more to hide her clenched fists from any curious eyes than to warm herself. Honestly, Sakura had all but forgotten the warm summer days of her youth, living as she did in a state of perpetual winter. And since the thought of returning to her home was an unbearable one, she wandered aimlessly. Letting her feet take her where they may, she wasn't surprised to find herself standing in front of the memorial stone.

She stared at it for a moment, seeing not the black obsidian with countless names meticulously carved into it. Instead she saw faces . . . so many faces – teammates, friends and even a lover or two. Better than most, she understood the draw of this place and was amazed, and not for the first time, how Kakashi had found the strength to take on another team, because she knew that she never could, even if her life depended on it.

"When did it all go so wrong?" She wondered aloud.

"Go wrong?" A too familiar voice repeated ironically. "When was it ever really right?"

She didn't bother to turn around. "Oh, I don't know. Maybe before you fucked off and abandoned us."

"I hate to break it to you, but before I left we were teammates, nothing more. Just because you had a crush, doesn't mean it was ever reciprocated. I never told you that I loved you, liked you or ever promised you anything."

"Sakura, you never, _ever_, had a claim on me."

She felt a painful rush at his words.

"Then what are you even doing here? Why can't you just leave me in peace?" Sakura demanded, hating herself for letting him get to her again.

Sasuke laughed.

A low and bitter sound that was as painful to her as it must have been for him.

"Leave you in peace that's a joke, you're the one who keeps _me_ here!" He moved towards her, one hand coiling through her hair and viciously yanking, to stare her down, his eyes glowing with intense emotion.

Under his harsh grip, a million retorts rose to her lips . . . and every one fell by the wayside. His forehead lowered to rest against hers, his breath mingling with hers in the cool night air.

"It's time, Sakura, it's been time. I've waited for what seems like forever for you to come to terms with this and you continue to resist. This can't go on. You have to let go."

She understood what he was saying, she did, but what he was asking was too much. After everything that happened and everything they never got to do, it was too damn much.

An oddly sympathetic smile curved his lips, as his hand gentled in her hair. "It's not too much, Sakura." Her eyes opened abruptly in surprise. "Out of the three of us, you've always been the strongest. The only one who could always do what was needed, no matter what the personal cost."

Staring up into his eyes, she could swear that she saw her future in them.

"No, your future lies here. It always has, being a healer. It's what you were always meant to be."

Sakura's lower lip trembled, before she suddenly broke free.

Wrapping her arms around her stomach, she demanded. "A healer? What the fuck good does it do me, to be healer when I can't save the ones I love the most? I couldn't save Ino, or Naruto . . . or . . . you. I couldn't even save you!"

"But you did, Sakura! You did!" He faced her, his words demanding that she believe him. "I don't know why you can't see that, why you insist on punishing yourself like this."

"Because I killed you," the words tore free from a cold, dark place within her, even as tears flowed unchecked down her face.

"_I killed you,"_ she repeated brokenly.

"Yes, you did that too." Sasuke starkly whispered in the still night, his eyes desperately focused on her.

Her knees gave out beneath her, leaving her sprawled out on the damp grass, as if his acknowledgement sapped whatever strength she had left. Suddenly she felt herself being pulled up and held against a warm chest and sighing, her head fell back to rest against his shoulder.

"Why did I do it? How could I have done it?" She spoke aloud, uncertain if she was asking herself or asking him.

"Well, as I remember it, I didn't give you much of a choice, Sakura." The steady, low rumble of words strangely soothed her. "Naruto and I had just fought and he was bleeding out. Remember you wanted to try and save him, but I wouldn't let you."

Images she had fought so hard to forget flooded her with all the impact of a chakra blast to her heart. "You wanted me to choose, you sonofabitch!" Her fingers dug deep into his arms, leaving deep nails marks.

"Choose? No, Sakura, for all your intellect, you never did understand, it wasn't a matter of making a choice. There was no choice involved. It was a matter of destiny."

That word roused her from emotional exhaustion.

"_Destiny?"_ Sakura demanded, her voice filled with outrage. "You did all of this, destroyed us all, for destiny?"

"You said it yourself, Sakura. You are the Healer, Naruto was the Hero and I was the Avenger. As it was, so will it be again."

"You stupid bastard!" She tried to pull away from him, but his arms held her tightly in his embrace.

"I hate you, Sasuke." Her voice rose until she was nearly screaming herself hoarse. "I hate you. I _fucking_ hate you!" Sakura fought wildly against his unyielding hold on her – body, heart and soul.

"No, you don't." Sasuke's frustration was clearly evident in his tight enunciation, "not nearly as much as you should. Isn't it finally time to be honest with yourself? Despite everything I did, I'm not the one you really blame. I'm not the one you hate or," his voice softened slightly, "the one you need to forgive."

"No . . ." she denied in a gasping breath, shaking her head. She didn't want to hear this. Did he want to destroy her completely?

"Were you always this stubborn? As time goes by, I find myself forgetting more and more." He laughed quietly, and she found a small smile curving her lips, before he continued more soberly. "If I had wanted to destroy you, then I would've blocked that last punch."

"You just stood there and took it," her voice seemed to be dazed.

"I betrayed everything you believed in when I killed Naruto." He shrugged as if the answer seemed so obvious. "I knew what was coming, and when it happened, there was no going back."

"Why? Why did you do it, Sasuke? Everything else could have been forgiven. Naruto . . . yeah, he was pissed, but you were his friend and as the Hokage, he could have - "

"What?" He cut her off harshly. "He could have what?" he demanded fiercely, not even giving her the chance to respond before sarcastically answering his own question.

"Interceded on my behalf, begged those Council bastards to forgive me? Played on me being the sole Uchica survivor? You think Konoha ever would have really accepted me again, trusted me? With my luck, I'd be lucky if they only locked me for the rest of my life, instead of taking out my eyes and leaving me for dead."

His voice was bitterness incarnate.

"And even if by some fucking miracle, he pulled out of ass, they actually did allow me to come back, it would only be a matter of time before something happened. Come on, Sakura, we both lived through the village's treatment of Naruto and that was under the order of the Third. You can't tell me, they loved the fact that the Kuybui container was their new Hokage."

"I knew damn well that if I returned, no one would ever tolerate us being together. No!" His voice overpowered hers when she sought to explain that she didn't care about them. "You, me, Naruto and maybe the survivors of the genin nine might have been fine with it, but the rest of them? It never would've happened and you know it!"

"And I told him that, Sakura, but that stupid dobe," his voice broke for the first time and she could feel the tension in his body, he was squeezing so tightly.

She welcomed the pain.

"Well, you know Naruto and when he had his heart set on something, there was never any way to talk him out of anything. So we fought. It was the only way out, but in the end, he fucked it up. He pulled his punch _again_. I should've known, but he was the fucking Hokage and I just . . . I don't know, I thought it'd be different this time and I couldn't pull my chakra back in time and then . . . well, you saw it happen. He was just dead. After that . . . ."

He fell silent, his whole body trembling with the effort as he tried and failed to control his emotions.

With everything in her, Sakura wanted nothing more than to turn and take him in her arms. It was a longing that seared her to the bone, but the fear was too overwhelming. Deep in her heart, she wanted to always remember _her_ Sasuke and if she turned to see that damned curse seal engulfing him, she didn't know what she'd do.

Her eyes closed as her fingers gently traced along his forearms, worrying the deep impressions she had caused, trying to comfort this injury was the least she owned him.

"I know." Her words were little more than a hitched breath. "Naruto had told me what happened between the two of you all those years ago. I know you didn't mean it."

"If I hadn't meant the killing blow, I wouldn't have used it," he drawled the words out, daring her to take the bait.

"No, you didn't. You gave him an opening that he refused to accept. But what I can't for the life of me, understand is why," her voice hardened, "you refused me the same chance. If for no other reason, then I was your teammate! How _dare_ you leave me behind?"

Startled, Sasuke looked down to see her almost curled in on herself in his lap, with a bemused half-smile.

"What other choice did I have?"

"Again with choice?" She scoffed, unwillingly falling into their old pattern of squabbling. Ten years again, they might have been arguing over something as childish as differing methods of getting a peak under Kakashi's mask.

Her eyes fell open as she began to turn towards him only to land on the gleaming black stone. Her mood fell just as sharply. "You should have taken me with you. At least we could have been together. Leaving me here was nothing but an act of cowardice."

"And what you call cowardice, I call the one truly honorable thing I've ever done."

On one hand, his quiet response sent a chill down her spine, but it also lit a warm heat deep inside of her, slowly burning out the cold, dark shadows that haunted her.

"I know you what you wanted, Sakura. I've always been able to read your eyes. I wanted to give you the world, and instead you asked me for death. There were so many things I wanted from you, but that . . . that was the one thing I _couldn't_ ever take.

He paused for a moment, before finally leaning into her, whispering in her ear, "I've done all I can here."

His arms fell away from her and with an almost preternatural sense of foreboding she knew what was coming.

She turned to him at that moment and couldn't smother her cry of denial as she saw the faint moonlight piercing through him. "No, not yet. . ."

"You know this isn't real, Sakura. It's time to let go and heal yourself," the finality in his voice was what finally got to her through all the times she'd seen him since that last time.

The silence stilled her. In all the times he had appeared to her since that time – whether they had fought, fucked or just drove each other crazy – she'd always known that there would be a next time, and having that assurance taken away. . .

So this, she guessed, is what heartbreak feels like?

"Don't you love me?"

"Stupid. . ." He smirked at her, even as he faded out of her sight until she had to strain to hear his voice. "You think I'd have hung around here, otherwise?"

In a sudden rush, Sakura found herself alone for the first time in forever, freed of the ghosts from the past and left only with her memories.

And in a thin, high voice she began to sing, "Snail beats snake, snake beats toad, toad beats snail . . . "

From the edge of the tree line, a lone figure watched. Kakashi, the sensei, forced himself to suppress the impulse to offer her comfort, because as the Hokage, knew from experience some things were best left to be endured.

fin

anyway, there you have it. this isn't a fave paring of mine, so don't expect to see much of it from me in the future, but as it worked out, i rather liked it, hopefully you got something out of it too. :D

come on & bolster my confidence in what was an out-of-character piece for me. as you read this, i'm working on my other Naruto fic, so be kind & review.

remember . . . reviewing is good for your karma.


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